Life After Death ( Pt. Ganga Prasad Upadhyay )

The phenomena of life and death are indeed great mysteries , more perhaps the latter . Does somebody create us ? Who creates us and why ? If God creates us why does He let us die ? Is death a punishment ? If it is a punishment , how is it then that an innocent child who has not done anything wrong or , in any way , offended God , dies from disease or in an accident ? Similarly , why does a holy man who has spent all his life praying and doing good to others die ? More to the point is the question : Why is it that some are rich and some are poor , some intelligent and some foolish ? Why are then such disparities ? Who inflicts them and why ? If it is said that it is God's will , what sort of person is this God ? A self - willed tyrant , not answerable to anybody . unreasonable and unprincipled ? Then there is the question what is life . Sometimes a healthy man with all his organs intact is found dead . People say ' life ' is missing in him . What is this life ? Consciousness ? What is consciousness ? Sometimes a man may be unconscious and yet alive . He may continue in this state for years . Death is cessation of life but when you cannot define life , how can you

( Gītā , II , 27 ) Krishna says , ' All , from the humblest to the greatest , are subject to rebirth . There is no escape for them until and unless they merge into me . ' ( Gītā , VIII , 16 ) Birth and death will continue so long as man is not united with God . It suggests that their is an inexorable law controlling birth and death . According to this law , death and birth follow each other like day and night . That death is certain is understandable , but why also rebirth ? What proof is there that there is such a thing as rebirth ? This in fact forms part of the topic we are discussion . About rebirth Krishna says to Arjuna : ‘ O Arjuna , I have had many births , so also you , I know all about them but you do not know . ' ( Gītā , II , 5 ) Not only Arjuna , except for a few wise souls none seems to know or believe that there is such a thing as rebirth or even there is such a thing as the soul and that soul lives on even after death . With most people , death is the end of everything . At one time , however , ancestor worship was common all over the world . Even now it persists in many parts of the world , Christians and Moslems visit the graves of their friends and relations on every important occasion to offer flowers . Who do they offer flowers to if the body is everything ? Obviously they believe that there is such a thing as the soul ( perhaps they would prefer the word ' spirit ' ) which continues even after death